Resigned to be a Monster
by Becbet
Summary: Auron during Braska's Calm: It should have been me...


[Notes: This is just a short little ficlet I wrote a while ago for an AllPoetry contest. (Heh...That sounds pretty random, now that I've typed it out...) Anyway, this is from Auron's POV (I love you, Auron! fangirl squeal) and is basically about what he went through during the ten-year Calm after Braska's death (when he was stuck "raising" Tidus). Yeah. Now that I've explained it, go forth and read!]

_Resigned to be a Monster  
_

Being dead was not what I'd expected. Before joining with Braska in his pilgrimage I had always seen dying as the end of the line. It was "lights out," as the expression went. Once your body met its end, your soul would either be Sent to the Farplane or...you'd turn into a fiend. There were no zombies in Spira.  
  
Yet I still find it a bit amazing that I can be walking around as I am, in full control of my mental and physical facilities. I'm still aging, of course; I've been dead for three years and the only physical change has been the gray scattered through my hair and the worry lines that lay between my eyebrows and line either side of my mouth. I am not a zombie; my flesh is not rotting straight off my bones. If it were not for all that I've seen, I would be terrified of myself.  
  
Because what am I, really, if I'm not alive, and I'm not a zombie?  
  
I've asked myself this too many times to count. Am I no better than Yevon's hypocrite maester, Mika? I delude myself into thinking that I stayed behind because of my promise to Jecht, but that is but one hollow reassurance that allows me to sleep at night. (Strange, that the dead should need to sleep.) But when I'm awake, when I'm watching Jecht's son just go on living as if he had never known his father, as if the man had never existed (I really hate the kid sometimes) I can't help but think that I have no real right to be here. I should be nothing more than a damned swarm of pyreflies hovering aimlessly over the Moonflow.  
  
_It should have been me..._  
  
Gods, it's no use thinking like this. I lead myself in circles daily, as if caught in some bizarre ritual. Everything comes down to how I failed; how I let my lord, my summoner, my _friend_, march off to his death. I knew Braska's fate, but I did nothing to change it. He had such a strong will...but he was blinded by his hope. Jecht...at least Jecht knew they would fail. But that's worse somehow... That he would sacrifice himself for a world that cared nothing for him, just because he couldn't find a way home...  
  
But I did it, Jecht! You've become this monster for nothing! You could have seen your son again, Jecht, and your wife! You could have been with them if only I had...If only I had...  
  
_If only I had done my damned duty and gone in your place... If I had become the Final Aeon..._  
  
...you'd be here now, Jecht, watching your son chase that fool blitzball through the waves. He's no good, you know; he tries, but he's just no good. I can't be his father, Jecht; I'm hardly his friend. I don't know...I just don't know what you want me to do...  
  
_What do you want me to do?_  
  
I've thought about it often, my friend, about our journey together with Braska, Yevon's lies, all of it, and I realize that Spira's cycle has to continue. Braska had to die so peace could breathe over the people again, if only for so short a time. And Jecht, I understand why you chose to go with him, to become Sin; it's just that I hate to recognize the necessity or your sacrifices. The reason I'm here Jecht, and not you, is because I'm a fool. I'm a fool and a coward and a monster. I _am_ the living dead. I _am_ a walking nightmare. If your son knew what I really was he would be terrified of me. He would hate me because of his fear, and because I let his father become a monster too.  
  
So here we are, a thousand years apart, both of us waiting for the end of my decade-long exile; for the day when I'll bring your son to kill you. I promise you that, Jecht: We will kill you. I will kill you.  
  
I am a monster, Jecht, I can manage this; it's the least I can do.


End file.
